Solstice launches R1234yf car AC retrofit kit
8th September 2026
BELGIUM: Solstice has announced the launch of its R1234yf vehicle air conditioning system retrofit kit, enabling the conversion of existing R134a vehicle systems to the low GWP alternative.
The development, which was first announced in September 2024, is intended for professional workshops servicing the large installed base of vehicles that continue to operate with R134a air conditioning systems. According to Solstice, there are currently more than 100 million vehicles with R134a systems in Europe, alongside newer vehicles operating with R1234yf.
The retrofit is designed to enable professional workshops to accommodate R1234yf without needing to replace or modify existing 134a air conditioning system components.
“The Direct-to-YF retrofit concept has been developed over the last three years to help address the need for a more widely available refrigerant option for older R134a vehicles,” said Solstice’s vice president and general manager of automotive refrigerants Rick Winick.
The retrofit process involves recovering the R134a refrigerant from the vehicle system, fitting a pair of newly-designed snap-on R134a to R1234yf adapters, injecting a small amount of a specially developed oil additive designed to optimise oil return to the compressor before recharging the vehicle system with R1234yf. Finally, an R1234yf refrigerant identification label is then applied under the bonnet.
“We have made this retrofit option easy for technicians to adopt,” Winick continued. “Independent technical evaluations and risk assessments have concluded that retrofit use is acceptable within the same assessment framework applied to new vehicle air conditioning systems. These conclusions are based on independent reports assessing retrofit performance and the use of R1234yf in retrofit-suitable vehicle air conditioning systems.”
A Solstice spokesperson said that the company had been working with SAE International, TÜV and MACS over the past two years and collaborated with specialists on permanent adapters and oil return improvers. The retrofit has also been tested on a fleet of retrofitted R134a vehicles to monitor retrofit performance and reliability and evaluate component durability under field conditions. The SAE standard has been completed and is going through the approval process.
The price of R134a has been rising considerably in Europe due to the constraints of the European F-gas regulations and a decreasing availability under the quota system. This recently prompted the German Automobile Club (ADAC) to advise members to avoid purchasing cheap vehicle AC refill kits which are sometimes offered online as R12 or HC12a, but actually contain flammable butane or propane.
Solstice’s Direct-to-YF retrofit kit is intended for professional workshops and service providers and will be made available through the automotive aftermarket supply chain across the UK and Europe.
There has been no announcement from Chemours who also announced an R134a to R1234yf retrofit kit in 2024.
Related stories:
Chemours insists A2L auto AC retrofit is safe – 11 September 2024
USA: Chemours has insisted that the R134a to R1234yf vehicle air conditioning retrofit solution it co-developed with Honeywell is safe and sustainable. Read more…
Honeywell and Chemours announce R1234yf auto retrofits – 9 September 2024
USA: Leading refrigerant manufacturers Chemours and Honeywell have separately announced a means to retrofit older vehicles using R134a to the latest air conditioning refrigerant R1234yf. Read more…
